NHS Staff Vaccines

I was 100% for making NHS staff get vaccines or having the choice of being fired if they won't, till I heard someone voice the fact that this could leave the NHS denuded of an estimated 116,000 - 130,000 staff - 6% to 8% of the total, more in London - at a time when they're most needed and cases are spiralling. It is indeed a quandary - you're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't.

While I can understand there are varied and entirely valid reasons for people not having vaccines, ranging from bad experiences after the first jab to health conditions that are not compatible with the vaccine, the ones doing it for ideological reasons do not deserve to be in a care environment; it is, after all, the National Health Service, not the National Infection Service and the experience in care homes during the 1st lockdown should be a salutary lesson. Some 85% of staff are frontline workers, but it's not known what percentage of these are unvaccinated.

So, what's to do? I suppose those on the frontline could be redeployed into back office roles, as has been suggested, but you can't simply replace a trained frontline worker with an untrained back office worker more used to operating a typewriter. Perhaps more stringent testing when going on shift is the only solution that's available. Also, it might be prudent to see what percentage of frontline staff are unvaccinated before kicking off precipitative action - there may not even be a problem and all unvaccinated staff never come into contact with patients.

If, as is suggested in the budget, public sector staff are to receive pay rises next year, perhaps those who are not vaccinated should not receive any pay rises, as a form of encouragement?

To return to the vaccine ideologues; conspiracy theories, whether they be left or right wing, are rooted in the belief that reality is not as it seems and we are all controlled by a mysterious cabal - and that cabal is invariably alleged to be Jewish. There is a proven, high correlation between conspiracy theories and antisemitism.

Conspiracy theorists follow a belief system just as powerful as religion, which is why they're immune to fact, evidence, logic and critical thinking. Beliefs and emotions trump facts among conspiracy theorists and, if challenged, they change the subject, refusing to engage with any proven fact, claiming it to be irrelevant.